


Stars Like Daggers

by adoxyinherear



Category: Star Wars Legends: The Old Republic (Video Game)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-12-27
Updated: 2021-01-21
Packaged: 2021-03-10 21:00:52
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 4,826
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28353579
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/adoxyinherear/pseuds/adoxyinherear
Summary: After the murder of Hedarr Soongh, the hunter needs a drink - and maybe something more.--I love Gault Rennow's stupid mouth and couldn't get this out of my head. Smitten with Torian Cadera, too, so this ought to be interesting. Follows the bounty hunter class storyline, blatantly an excuse to write more feelings.
Relationships: Female Bounty Hunter/Gault Rennow, Female Bounty Hunter/Torian Cadera
Kudos: 11





	1. A Damn Fine Line

It’s easier to do the gunning down than to watch helplessly as somebody else does it. Or that’s what Arzuna told herself when she agreed to Gault’s request to escape somewhere with “shiny lights and an open bar.”

At least the tables were sticky with spilled drinks instead of blood.

“We’ll take two Dressellian beers,” Gault announced when the droid dispensing drinks circled around to their table.

“We will not,” Arzuna interrupted. “Unless you’re trying to poison your way out of our agreement?”

Gault’s brows, already arched courtesy of his Devaronian heritage, pitched higher.

“Borderline unpotable beverages are all I can afford on my salary, hunter.”

“I’ll have a juma juice and my _associate_ here will have a Sith scorcher,” Arzuna told the droid, holding out her credit chip. When it rolled away, beeping merrily, she leaned back against the cheaply upholstered booth they’d secured within sight of both cantina entrances. In her line of work, it never hurt to be prepared - and it almost always hurt when you weren’t. Gault studied her, eyes dark with calculation despite what she was beginning to think was a permanent smirk.

“Why a Sith scorcher?”

“Maybe I’m hoping you’ll try to drink it while it’s still on fire. Or are the insides of your bodies as flame-resistant as the outside?”

“Curious about my body already, hunter?”

“Only in relation to how easy you’d be to kill.”

There was no venom in the words, though, and Gault knew it. 

When the droid returned with drinks, Gault’s flared and went out within a few seconds, after which he sipped it gratefully. Arzuna tried to pace herself but banishing the sight of Soongh’s lifeless body was at the bottom of the glass and it was three-quarters gone before the band finished a full song. 

“I gotta say, I thought you’d have a stronger stomach for slaughter in your line of work,” Gault observed. His tone was probing. It was an old habit, impossible for Arzuna to suppress, to imagine which one of them could draw their weapon under the table first. 

“I kill when I’m paid to, or I have to. What those Mandalorians did - that’s murder.”

“Damn fine line, hunter.”

“It’s still a line.”

The droid must have had some kind of predictive programming because it brought Arzuna another drink, and she wasn’t even a little sorry to drain the first glass and accept it. 

“Soongh… he took a risk, giving me that tip. And now he’s dead,” she murmured, voice hard, blunt, like a blade in want of sharpening. “I should’ve killed them all when I had the chance.”

“It might not have made any difference.”

Arzuna grunted, unwilling to concede the point. When she shifted in the booth she suppressed a wince. She’d been lucky to escape the fight with only a blaster bolt graze, but it still stung. Alcohol would help with that, too.

The band began another set and Arzuna was on her third drink when Gault leaned forward, the cavity of his broken horn black as an empty eye. The shadow there looked velvet soft. 

“You know what I think? I think you just don’t like to lose.”

“Does anyone?”

“No, but they don’t take it so personally.”

“Maybe because they’ve had more experience.”

Arzuna was bragging but it was a cover and they both knew it. Maybe she was beginning to like the devil in him or maybe she was just this side of drunk, but she brought her face close enough to Gault’s to smell the alcohol on his breath. Heat radiated off his skin and Arzuna wondered if there was more, under his shirt.

“Drinking’s not my favorite remedy for putting a bad job out of my mind. One more of these,” she said, lifting her nearly empty glass, “and I’ll need an escort to the ship. Two more and it’s all the way to my bunk.”

It was the first time she’d seen surprise in the Devaronian’s eyes. Arzuna didn’t know if that said more about him than it did about her.

“You sure about that?” But Gault was already flagging the droid down, holding up two fingers. “I’m not a nice man, hunter.”

“I don’t need a nice man.”

“ _Oh,_ ” Gault said, giving the word about three more syllables than it ought to have, “I think you do.”

Despite her claims to the contrary, she had more than enough sense once they were back on the D5-Mantis to close the door to her quarters and strip out of her armor without any help - but her blasters, those she kept within arm’s reach. Gault’s only response was to chuckle.

He left his own rifle at the foot of the bed but he was nimble enough with his hands, his legs, and _oh,_ his tongue, that he wasn’t in any danger of needing it.


	2. A Loaded Statement

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The hunter likes listening to Gault's stories, among other things.

It wasn’t supposed to happen again.

But Arzuna let it. 

For as selfish as he was with his credits, with his time in the refresher, with his patience for their paid work - Gault was generous in bed. He didn’t chase pleasure. He took his time, bringing Arzuna to the shrieking edge of her own climax before letting himself get close. Few of her lovers, regardless of their sex or species, had shown such restraint.

And Gault was certainly one from whom she’d least expected it.

If Mako noticed the special attention Arzuna paid to the newest member of their crew - or if she heard the screams - she didn’t say anything. The slicer hadn’t even blushed when Gault made a crude, if contextually inconspicuous, remark when Arzuna stowed her gear and exposed a bruised hip. 

“Careful where you sit, hunter.”

Arzuna hadn’t earned that particular wound - perfectly oval, with the graze of teeth in its center - in a fight.

Gault liked to talk, too, though that didn’t surprise her.

“Did I ever tell you about the Jawa junk dealer who…”

“I once swindled a Corellian spice smuggler…”

“I made a wager with a sand dweller on Tatooine who tried to pay with a desiccated Krayt dragon tongue…”

She liked listening to his stories and didn’t care if they were true or not. His bravado was almost a comfort in its consistency, his schemes complex and amusing. And Arzuna liked his voice. She liked to close her eyes and feel the hum of his lips against her belly, her thighs, her clit, his words inconsequential but for their honeyed delivery.

Two standard weeks after she'd invited him to her quarters for the first time and flush from their victory on the Aurora and his careful ministrations, Arzuna lay contented, spent, and naked while Gault continued to run his fingers down her body. His nails were slightly hooked, but not as lethal as they appeared.

“You didn’t kill Blood. Why not? It would have shut him up, at least,” he asked, trying to sound casual. But she was learning the way he pitched his voice when he was genuinely curious.

“I don’t hear him talking now.”

“You know what I mean. He killed Mako’s father - or whoever. He violated that little code of honor among hunters that’s so important to you. And he was a real dick,” Gault pressed, tracing a line from knee to belly to breast. “You could’ve shown him you were better than he was.”

“I did,” Arzuna said on an exhale as one of those fingers slipped lower, inside, deep. Not lethal but certainly skillful. “I didn’t need to fight him to show him. He was beneath me.”

“No,” Gault murmured, freeing his hands to shift and flip her so his chin could graze her thigh, one of his horns pressed against her hip. She hovered above him now, ready all over again. “I am.”

It was a loaded statement, but she was too distracted by the sudden, slick work of his tongue to worry about it.


	3. Not a Kid

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “It’s only through challenge that we learn our worth,” Torian said, words older than his years. “That you bested the beast on your first try - there must be a greater battle ahead of you. A real test.”
> 
> Arzuna considered this. It was what she was chasing, always. The next bounty. The next kill. The next payout. It never felt like enough, but not like it seemed to for Gault - she liked to spend their money as much as she liked to earn it, but she sensed there was an end to the number of credits she’d need or want and that end was quickly approaching.
> 
> But she wasn’t yet sure what she’d be chasing after.
> 
> \--
> 
> The hunter meets Torian Cadera (and I'm smitten, so).

“An audience with Mandalore himself? No wonder Mako’s eyes are still hanging halfway out of her head.”

“Not everyone worships credits, Gault. Some of us have real heroes,” Mako retorted. Arzuna had to admit that there was a glow about the girl that didn’t have anything to do with the D5-Mantis’ erratic lighting, or the bottle of Cassandran brandy they were passing around in celebration.

“And now we’re, what? Doing a job for free because _he asked nicely_?” Gault shook his head. “I thought winning the Great Hunt meant more credits, not less.”

Arzuna’s expression was shrewd, playful. She swiped the bottle from Gault’s hands even as he was lifting it to his mouth.

“I’m sure you’ll find something on Dromund Kass worth your time,” she teased, holding his eyes as she took a long swallow.

“Dromund Kass? No, thank you,” Gault replied. “Tyresius Lokai has one too many unpaid debts in Kaas City. Nobody holds a grudge like a Sith. You’re on your own.”

“You’ll have me,” Mako affirmed. “‘I’m not stupid enough to double cross a Sith.”

“Who said anything about double crossing?” Gault cried. “It was a misunderstanding.”

But Arzuna only laughed and later with his face between her legs, begged him for the details.

True to his word - a feat worth noting where Gault was concerned - he remained on the ship while she and Mako traveled to the Mandalorian encampment. Arzuna didn’t expect to have to defend herself against judgment, and was surprised when Mako wasn’t the only one who came to her aid.

“She’s more warrior than you, Jogo. Huntmaster declared her Grand Champion,” one of the Mandalorians said, his smooth, even tone matched by his expression, soft but for identical, stylized scars beneath each of his eyes. He looked at her, blue eyes thoughtful. “It’s an honor.”

“Nice to meet you, too, kid,” Arzuna replied, though he couldn’t have been more than a few years younger than she was. “Got a name?”

“Torian Cadera. Not a kid.”

He didn’t hesitate and as with Jogo, there was nothing in his tone to suggest anything more than polite correction. She’d met her fair share of Mandalorians even before the Great Hunt, but this one was careful in a way that surprised her.

And she was surprised, too, that she hoped she hadn’t offended him without meaning to. 

“I’m sorry about that,” Arzuna admitted, a whisper of remorse in her tone. But Torian genuinely didn’t seem to mind, and made up for Jogo’s rude welcome by pointing her in the direction of the caves and wishing her luck in the hunt.

Not that she needed it. After the Jedi, a beast - no matter how massive - felt like less of a challenge. 

Still, she and Mako both required more than a simple kolto patch when they emerged victorious and the Mandalorians were all too happy to oblige. While Mako entertained no fewer than five young warriors and seemed almost oblivious to their interest, Arzuna sat near a fire nursing a spice beer Jogo had offered her in congratulations. The night sky was a deep purple, cloudless, the stars like scattered daggers.

“Mandalore chose his champion well.” 

It was Torian. He sat down across from her, a comfortable distance for talking, his eyes unreadable by firelight. 

“It was a tough fight,” Arzuna conceded. “But I’m glad I was worthy of the challenge.”

“It’s only through challenge that we learn our worth,” Torian said, words older than his years. “That you bested the beast on your first try - there must be a greater battle ahead of you. A real test.”

Arzuna considered this. It was what she was chasing, always. The next bounty. The next kill. The next payout. It never felt like enough, but not like it seemed to for Gault - she liked to spend their money as much as she liked to earn it, but she sensed there was an end to the number of credits she’d need or want and that end was quickly approaching.

But she wasn’t yet sure what she’d be chasing after.

“I guess I’ll know when I lose,” Arzuna mused. “ _If_ I lose.”

Torian didn’t smile, but his tone warmed, only just.

“If you lose.”

He didn’t sound like he believed she could.

And Arzuna liked that a whole lot.


	4. Disarmed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I’m burning this before we go back to the ship,” Gault complained as they followed Cadera’s instructions in the Geroya be Haran. 
> 
> “What, your shirt? Or the planet?”
> 
> Gault’s expression was sharp.
> 
> “Still keen on being a Mandalorian, after you let one of them slather you in monster shit?”
> 
> \--
> 
> Hunting Jicoln Cadera and making bad jokes. Also, the hunter wonders if Torian's got nice hands.

Arzuna could’ve lost fingers and still needed only one hand to count the number of men who’d drawn a blaster on her and lived. 

“You must _like_ him,” Gault had said, teasingly drawing out the operative word. “If I tried that, I’d be wearing my face on the back wall.”

She had to wonder if he was right.

On both counts.

But Torian Cadera had shown himself to be an ally, just as he had done on Dromund Kass. Arzuna couldn’t begrudge his hunting the man. She might’ve only been newly adopted, but you didn’t need to be Mandalorian to understand what honor meant to them. Part of her wished it hadn’t been her mercenary spirit that had gotten her this far.

“I gotta say, I liked watching you disarm the kid,” Gault observed after they’d parted ways with Torian. “Did you practice putting your boots to men’s throats when you were younger, or did it come naturally?”

Eyes on the sunken muck of a road, Arzuna smirked when she answered.

“Are you jealous of him, Gault?" She asked, though she suspected that even if he were, the Devaronian wouldn't admit it. "And I’ve worked for every damn thing I have and you know it.”

Which was good, because Jicoln Cadera wasn’t going to make it easy for either of them. Arzuna was forced to reevaluate her definition of an inhospitable world halfway through a night camped on Taris. She’d thought Hutta was foul, but Taris was little more than a swampy tomb.

The rakghouls were good hunting, though - and Arzuna found she wanted to murder every last one of them after a day spent covered in their filth. 

“I’m burning this before we go back to the ship,” Gault complained as they followed Torian’s instructions in the Geroya be Haran - a Mandalorian death game. Of course Mandalorians had death games.

“What, your shirt? Or the planet?”

Gault’s expression was sharp.

“Still keen on being a Mandalorian, after you let one of them slather you in monster shit?”

“You should’ve asked Torian for help, Gault. You missed a spot,” Arzuna teased, reaching for him.

“Oh, no you don’t. Don’t you dare touch me.”

Arzuna suppressed a laugh at Gault’s distress, not wanting to give away their location. She turned over the reminder of Torian’s brusque touch in a part of her mind not focused on the task at hand - a part that wasn’t thinking about shooting or getting shot, a part that wondered about the calluses on Torian’s hands if he took his gloves off. 

What his hands might feel like, if he took his gloves off. 

Later, when they tracked Jicoln through the mud, his dark, splattered blood a map, she hoped she’d done the right thing leaving Torian behind after they’d found him wounded in his father’s bolthole. He’d told her he wasn’t a kid, and Arzuna believed him. He could take care of himself. 

And she wasn’t going to let Jicoln get away, not this time.

Not on her first hunt as a Mandalorian.

But when the moment arrived to deliver the killing blow, there was Torian, limping but fierce, his blue eyes ablaze with fury. 

“He and I aren’t done!”

Their eyes were the same color, but for the pain that clouded Jicoln’s. And, she thought, resignation in their aged depths. Arzuna felt like she had walked into a story in its final chapter, some deep betrayal between father and son, the honor of a clan on the line. 

Better to die at his son’s hand. 

When she lowered her weapon, Arzuna felt the charge between Jicoln and Torian a moment before he fired. Not resignation, then. 

Resolution.


	5. His Quiet Way

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I can do that,” Torian conceded, wiping his hands on a cloth and rising. Arzuna noted that his nails were blunt, fingers long and fine, his square palm strong. So much about him spoke of strength, though his voice - that was dangerously gentle. Harmless as a garroting wire in your hand, or the light a dagger might catch in the instant before it was thrown.
> 
> Best not to underestimate his voice.
> 
> \--
> 
> A middle of the night conversation between Torian and the hunter after he joins he crew. With bonus feelings.

Too much time planetside always disrupted Arzuna’s internal clock. Though it felt late when she gave up trying to sleep and descended to rummage in the cargo hold for something to read or maybe swipe Gault’s Pazaak deck, it could’ve been any hour.

That Torian was awake with his blaster rifle disassembled and a bore brush in one hand meant he couldn’t rest, either - or it was time for breakfast.

“Champion,” he said in his quiet way. “I didn’t expect anyone to be up.”

Late, then. 

“Worried somebody’s going to catch you servicing a weapon and call dibs, kid?”

“Call me Torian.”

“Only if you call me Arzuna,” Arzuna replied, leaning a hip against the nearest storage locker, all thoughts of entertainment in the form of cards or a datapad forgotten. 

“I can do that,” Torian conceded, wiping his hands on a cloth and rising. Arzuna noted that his nails were blunt, fingers long and fine, his square palm strong. So much about him spoke of strength, though his voice - that was dangerously gentle. Harmless as a garroting wire in your hand, or the light a dagger might catch in the instant before it was thrown.

Best not to underestimate his voice.

“Been meaning to tell you, it was decent of you to let me in on the kill,” Torian continued, either not noticing or not caring that Arzuna was quietly studying him. “You didn’t have to do that.”

She’d been surprised when Torian asked to join her crew - both in the ask, and in her own heart’s eager pumping when she told him yes. With Jicoln dead, she’d have had little reason to maintain any kind of contact with his son.

“Couldn’t let him keep dragging your clan’s honor through the dirt.”

“Looking forward to this,” Torian admitted. “Not everyone gets to fight beside the Champion of the Great Hunt.”

“I’m still getting used to it,” she said. “Being the Champion, and working with a team. I’ve been alone for a long time.”

“You’re a Mandalorian now,” Torian reminded her. “You’ll never be without your clan.”

“I know,” Arzuna murmured, thoughtful. Torian watched her, his blue eyes hooded, deep as the ocean of Manaan. It was too much to hold the gaze of somebody who looked at her like that so Arzuna turned and opened the locker, poking through its contents disinterestedly. She heard Torian behind her reassembling his weapon and a covert glance proved he was doing so swiftly and expertly, dexterous fingers reattaching the barrel and slide with ease. It made her sweat.

And of course, she’d opened a locker with nothing in it but a bunch of junk, a dumping ground for whatever Gault had gotten bored with. She chewed her lip thinking of the Devaronian asleep a few meters away. They’d been together only once since Mandalore had adopted her into his clan, and Gault had talked less, complained more. He'd seemed distracted and uncomfortable, berating her about honor in a way that made it weird.

It had always been weird, of course, but it had been good and it also hadn’t been _anything_ so it hadn’t mattered. 

But now? Now the Mandalorian behind her - a man who said more with four words and a look than Gault did in an hour’s chatter - clipped the magazine into his rifle with a satisfying _click_ that Arzuna heard as well as felt.

Snatching up a gourmet ration pack she hoped hadn’t spoiled, she turned to meet Torian’s liquid eyes again.

“Hungry?”

“I could eat,” Torian answered, lips soft with what Arzuna thought might’ve been a smile.

He left his gloves with the rifle.


	6. Body Heat

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Unapologetic flirting on Hoth.

Even with the gear the Empire had provided, Hoth was bitterly cold. The wind cut through Arzuna’s many layers like a vibrosword, making her bones ache. Her muscles felt limned with ice, slowing her reflexes and response time in a way that their enemies took total advantage of.

The sooner she confronted and captured Reneget Vause, the better. 

“He called you a ‘soft thing,’” Torian observed when they stopped to resupply at one of the Imperial outposts - and took longer than usual over their rations in the underground bunker. It wasn’t warm by any stretch of the imagination, but it was warm _er_.

“Who, Vause?”

“Yeah,” Torian clarified. “That’s not a word I’d use to describe you.”

“I’m sure there’s some parts of me that are soft. Nothing a brute like Vause could appreciate,” Arzuna replied with a smirk. She’d flirted more with Torian in the past few weeks than she had with anyone in a long time - since she was a teenager, at least, determined to test every weapon in her arsenal. There was just something so sweet about the way that she could surprise the Mandalorian, how _he_ could surprise _her_ \- he never blushed, and was as careful with his responses as he was with his weapons. 

Arzuna felt him watching her now, his gaze heavy and light at the same time. Every time, really, that she verbally shot down a jumped up official or a sleazy outlaw, Torian’s eyes were on her. She desperately wanted to ask him what he was thinking and what he thought about her, but that was something she’d never do. Even at fourteen, Arzuna hadn’t cared what the boys she’d toyed with thought about her.

Though she wasn’t toying with Torian.

Ration pack emptied, Arzuna considered her gloves, still stiff with frost. 

“I am not looking forward to this,” she groused, and Torian followed her eyes. 

“Learned a trick when I was on a hunt on Vandor,” Torian offered, gesturing to Arzuna’s hands. “Pretty simple, actually. Your core body temperature should still be elevated so you can use your body’s own heat to warm your extremities.”

Torian demonstrated by crossing his arms and putting his hands under his armpits, then overlapped them on his stomach. Finally, he put them between his legs, sandwiched between armored thighs. His smile when he met Arzuna’s eyes again was slight - but bordered on wicked when paired with the knowledge in his gaze.

“If you’re recovering from exposure, you can use somebody else’s body heat to similar effect.”

Arzuna would not gulp, and she wasn’t looking away, either. “You have experience with that, too?”

“Not lately.”

“Something to consider,” she replied, echoing his own words back at him. 

Before she was compelled to test his theories in an empty, frigid corner of the bunker, Arzuna rose, checking her gear and her blasters. 

At least she’d have something warm to think about, on the ice.


	7. Personal Questions

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Torian and the hunter deserve a little privacy. Gault disagrees. 
> 
> \--
> 
> Builds out, a little, the canon conversation about seeing someone.

Arzuna perched on the edge of her bed in thermal leggings and the fitted, moisture-wicking top she wore under her armor, reviewing a requisition order from Mako. It felt so good not to be in layers that she half-considered sealing the door to her quarters and lounging in the nude - but despite the late hour, the crew was still active, eager for their arrival at Nar Shaddaa and a much needed respite.

When Torian approached the open door, expression carefully neutral, she rather wished she had, though. She wanted to see color in his cheeks. 

She wanted to see a whole lot more.

“The Jawa talks in his sleep,” Torian announced, leaning against the door frame. He still managed to look alert enough to draw on anybody who got too close. 

“Are you asking to bunk with me, Torian?”

“Not if you want to get any sleep,” he replied, voice even. “I expect I might, too.”

“If it’s in Mando’a, maybe I’ll pick up a few things.”

It was becoming a careful dance between them, Arzuna leading and Torian allowing himself to be led, but only so far. She had the sense that when Torian had seen or heard from her whatever it was he was waiting for, the tables would turn in an instant. It was clear he admired her, and not just her aim: he’d compared her to one of his friends, Corridan Ordo, a decorated Mandalorian he’d fought with in the past. Arzuna had been surprised by just how touched she was by the comparison. 

And now Torian was nearly in her quarters, looking at her like he was about to surprise her all over again.

“Mind if I ask you a personal question?”

Torian wasn’t the sort of man who hesitated, but Arzuna felt like he’d been working himself up to this conversation.

“If I answer it, I get to ask you something personal,” she teased.

“Fair enough. Are you seeing anyone?”

Arzuna swallowed before she spoke to force her heart back down where it belonged.

“No, but I could be talked into it, by the right guy.”

“Really. I’ll have to remember that,” Torian replied, and Arzuna imagined she could feel his breath, the vibration of his lips, when he said the word 'really.' “Guess it’s only fair I let you ask one, too. Shoot.” 

“Your turn to tell me,” she said, confident that the tremors she felt couldn’t be heard in her voice. “You seeing anyone?”

“Not yet. Thinking about it, though.”

They just looked at each other then, Torian armed and armored in the doorway, Arzuna half-dressed with the forgotten datapad hanging in her hand. She wanted to ask him what thinking had to do with it, but she knew better. Torian was the first man Arzuna had met who took the time to think.

And it made her want him even more.

“I could stir the sexual tension up here with a spoon.”

Gault had chosen that moment to ascend the stairs, looking between the two of them with a smirk that didn’t reach his eyes.

“We can talk later,” Torian said, ignoring the Devaronian. His electric blue eyes remained fixed on Arzuna’s until he turned to walk away, more in them that he hadn’t said.

Yet.

Gault watched Torian leave, shaking his head.

“You know, this is nothing seven minutes in the refresher couldn’t fix,” Gault said, expression devious. “Or three times as long with me.”

Arzuna snorted.

“That’s generous,” she replied, harsh but tender, too. That’s how it had been with Gault, before, and would be forever, she thought. “You had your shot.”

Gault was watching the stair Torian had just disappeared down and when he responded, his tone was soft, resigned.

“No, I really didn’t.”


	8. Expectations

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After the ambush on Nar Shaddaa, a tender moment in the med bay.

“This isn’t how I imagined our night going.”

Torian timed his words to cover Arzuna’s hiss of pain as he examined the worst of her wounds. 

“And I would’ve thought Mandalorians couldn’t call it a party without a little bloodshed,” Arzuna said, unclenching her jaw. Their attackers must have had prior experience fighting Mandalorians, as they hadn’t just gotten lucky with a vibroknife - in addition to a few shallow strikes, she had a deep cut in the vulnerable gap where her armor met her flamethrower. She was going to need microsutures.

“A little, sure.”

They’d been ambushed on Nar Shaddaa; what should have been a celebration, a night off, ended in the death of every one of the living Champions - except Arzuna. She knew she should feel remorse for lives lost, and maybe she'd make time for that later. For now, there was only simmering rage.

Torian had come out of the fight with a few bruises, but nothing serious. Though tough as a Krayt dragon, Torian was pragmatic: when he was wounded, he submitted to treatment without complaint, displaying none of the bravado Arzuna had witnessed among other young men who’d feign health to seem strong. Torian knew he was strong, and he knew when he was hurt. He didn’t need to pretend. It was just one more thing Arzuna admired about him.

Another was the way he was carefully cradling her hand, palm up, while he applied a bacta patch to her forearm. 

“What were you expecting?”

The question came out quieter than she’d meant it to, her soft voice an invitation for Torian to come closer to hear her better. He was already standing beside the bio bed where she sat, and Arzuna had a strong urge to part her legs so he could step into them. 

“Something else,” he murmured, gaze penetrating. Torian’s eyes were twin seas, ocean worlds viewed from orbit.  Arzuna’s lips parted and she forgot all about the way the vibroknife had felt when it plunged into muscle, the smug expressions of righteousness on the faces of their Jedi attackers, the bounty on her head. Her knee brushed against Torian’s thigh and he nudged her legs open reflexively. 

“Boss, Blizz have something special to show you - something really special to help you forget all about big bounty on your head,” Blizz rattled off, voice preceding him from the corridor into the medbay. Torian stepped back as the Jawa bustled in, oblivious, holding up what looked like a hunk of scrap metal that had nevertheless been lovingly polished until it shone. 

“What is it, Blizz?”

Arzuna pitched her voice higher, disguising the feeling that had sunk her stomach when Torian put extra space between them. 

One disappointment after another hadn’t been Arzuna’s plan for the evening, either.


End file.
